Sep
10
7:00 PM19:00
CE (and Related) Events
Critical Engagements sponsors, co-sponsors, and publicizes a wide range of events on and off the CMU campus throughout the year. Please click on event titles for full details.
Filtering by: The American City
Sep
11
6:00 PM18:00
A Date with Pearl (featuring Rhonda Welsh)
Critical Engagements, in partnership with the Creative Writing program at Central Michigan University, invites you to join us for a book talk and interview with Rhonda Welsh, Executive Director of Detroit Outreach at CMU and the author of the new novel Pearl (2026). Free and open to the public.
Sep
24
7:00 PM19:00
Oct
24
10:00 PM22:00
Detroit Tour: The Wright Museum and Historic Detroit
Critical Engagements and the Honors Program will co-host a trip to Detroit for students and alumni on October 24, 2026. It features guided tours of the Charles H. Wright Museum of African American History and a Detroit neighborhood. Round-trip bus and museum tickets are provided for all students.
Oct
29
6:00 PM18:00
Cedric Taylor on Benton Harbor (Emma Norman Todd Lecture
CMU’s Multicultural Academic Student Services presents the 2026 Emma Norman Todd lecture, featuring filmmaker and sociologist Dr. Cedric Taylor.
October 29, 2026, 6:00 p.m., Plachta Auditorium. Free and open to the public.
Nov
4
9:00 AM09:00
Motor City MACtion Tour: The DIA and Historic Detroit
Critical Engagements will co-host a trip to Detroit for students and alumni on November 4, 2026, as part of CMU’s Motor City MACtion activities. It features guided tours of the Detroit Institute for the Arts and a Detroit neighborhood. Round-trip bus and museum tickets are provided for all students. The bus will return to Mount Pleasant after the football game.
Apr
24
3:00 PM15:00
"A Benton Harbor Story": A New Film by Cedric Taylor
Please join us in Anspach 161 on Friday, April 24, at 3:00 p.m. for an exclusive pre-screening of Cedric Taylor's new film, A Benton Harbor Story" This is the kickoff event for Critical Engagements 2026–2027, when we'll announce our new theme for next year: "The American City: Detroit and Beyond."
A Benton Harbor Story examines how racism, infrastructural decline, and the erosion of democracy converged to produce a water crisis—and how a poor, majority-Black community fought to save itself.
Though the Flint water crisis lingers in recent memory, Benton Harbor has its own story to tell. Many Americans see cities like Benton Harbor through the lens of the past, but its story may foretell an unsettling future for the rest of us.
